


The Man in Gauze

by DearPoppy



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: (It's not Makkachin don't worry lol), Animal Death, Courage the Cowardly Dog AU, Gen, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-26
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2021-01-03 08:56:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21176768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DearPoppy/pseuds/DearPoppy
Summary: Creepy stuff is happening in Nowhere. It's up to Makkachin to save her lovely home!--Or, the Courage the Cowardly Dog AU.





	The Man in Gauze

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my first time posting on AO3, so I'm feeling a little shy! But, please enjoy this story I've been working on since... last Halloween lol. I love Courage the Cowardly Dog so much, so this is pretty self-indulgent. While this one chapter is all I have completed, I'm thinking of writing more based off some of my favorite episodes. Eventually. This one's based on the episode I always found the creepiest! Jeepers!
> 
> But ya lol thank you for reading!

Makkachin did lots of things for love. Crazy, reckless things, but all in the name of good things—in the name of good people.

She lived in a little farm house in a little plot of land with a little chicken coop and a little windmill and a little, beaten-up, bright pink truck. The soil was mostly brown, clay-like with cracks that reminded her of the cracked chocolate surface of the brownies that she __definitely__ wasn’t supposed to eat, ever, like, __ever__. But in spite of the dry, dry soil they had a pretty little garden off to the side, vegetables and fruits and herbs (but never, __ever__ eggplants). There were no other houses in sight, no trees—not even a tumbleweed—for miles upon miles. All that existed was the blue sky above them and the bare earth and the highway that stretched __forever__.

That’s all that was there in this quaint little slice of Nowhere.

Except not really, because she had her parents. They kept the farm running, spruced up the place with their gardens and their rustling-about in the chicken coop and the fresh paint they’d apply to the farmhouse. There’d be freshly-baked pies on the windowsills and good food and—oh, now she’s hungry. Was it lunchtime already?

She stops her lazy digging into the clay dirt and pads carelessly across the yard, up the creaky, rickety wooden porch steps and through the green-painted screen door. Papa is sitting in the chair as he is reading over the newspaper, brows furrowed in frustration with whatever it is he sees. She patters up to him, sets her fluffy brown head on his knee and __boofs__.

“Hello, Makka-Makkachin,” he coos. “Dusty thing. You’re tracking dirt over the floors again. Wash up real quick; your dad’s about finished with lunch.”

She loved Dad’s lunches; they were always so yummy with runny eggs and sticky rice and just pure __goodness__. Papa made good meals too—hearty meat and stewed vegetables, but something always, __always__ had a touch of vinegar. She wasn’t all too keen on vinegar. He swore on it.

Makkachin makes quick work of washing her paws off in the bathroom sink, and she can’t help the wag of her tail when she hears the muffled call of her dad.

“Vitya, Makka! Lunchtime!”

Papa is helping Dad plate the table as Makkachin comes down to the kitchen. She’s so excited to see fried, breaded pork cutlets with the fluffiest white rice and a lovely little side dish of colorful veggies in a salad.

“Here, Makka,” says Dad, flour stains on his off-yellow apron, “Be a dear and carry the salad to the table, please.”

Makkachin nods, and in no time they’re tucking into another yummy lunch (“Onion-free for our darling Makka!”), pork so tender and juicy on her tongue that she’s just __ascending__—

And then there’s a frantic knocking at their door.

“Oh,” says Papa, dabbing at a corner of his mouth ever so delicately. “I’ll go see who it is.”

Makkachin has a nonsense sensor that’s so fine-tuned she could almost feel her ears jab upwards. Dad was looking towards the main room curiously, hands anxiously clenched against his olive green shirt, but he rises to join Papa when they hear another frantic voice. Now clearly, Makkachin can’t let them deal with this alone. Right?

There’s a rather frazzled looking cat at the door dressed more like a mafioso than anything with his pinstripe suit. His little fedora and the sleeves of his pressed shirt look a little worse for wear with mud smudges and who knows what else. In his grasp is a large sheet of stone with strange markings on it. It sets Makkachin on edge.

“I’m a scholar, y’see,” he says, sounding __definitely__ not like a scholar. “We’ve been looking for the famous Slab of King Ramses for centuries, now, and us science-y folk would love to learn more about ol’ Ramses by lookin’ at this here rock! But y’see, real bad guys are out to sell this slab, and I’ve been runnin’ from them, tryin’ to protect this thing in the name of, y’know, science and all that jazz!”

This is complete tomfoolery, a farce, and __surely__ her parents see this—

“Oh, you poor thing,” says Papa, hand splayed over his overall-clad chest. “We’ll be more than willing to let you rest here for a moment. Isn’t that right, Yuuri?”

Dad nods with his brows furrowed in concern. “Of course, darling. This man’s only trying to do the right thing! Come in, come in—join us for lunch, please!”

Makkachin watches them enter the kitchen chatting like they were all old friends.

“Oh,” she groans quietly to herself. “I just __know__ something bad is going to happen, or my name is Yuri Plisetsky… and it’s not.”

++++

The strange little cat—who claims he is a scholar of the Smithsonian of all places—eats her dad’s food with gusto, rice grains flying in every which direction. Papa and Dad find this endearing by the smiles on their faces, but Makkachin knows better. She could let her Dad slide—after all, his tie collection was hideous and his sense of fashion had always been skewed towards the stranger end of the spectrum. But for __Papa__ to be fooled… Why, he’d been the face of Vogue in his early twenties! He could look at an outfit from the other side of a soccer field and tell you its brand and season in under fifteen seconds with __utmost__ accuracy.

What she’s getting at is this: no respectable person of any higher institution would be caught __dead__ in a suit that looked like a K-Mart clearance rack reject from 1940. And his filthy appearance was not solely attributed to his self-proclaimed heroic endeavors to protect that odd, unsettling slab he __refused__ to put down. He would wipe grease stains onto his sleeves, and he yapped as he chewed, spittle flying everywhere.

She could hardly suppress a low growl, though she did manage to disguise the one that was audible as a strange cough.

Eventually, the family and surprise guest retreated to the living room. The TV played soft and low, a mere whisper compared to the boisterous bragging of the “Smithsonian Scholar.”

“Graduated top of my class!” he said proudly, one paw thumping against his chest, his other arm tightly wrapped around the slab of stone. Papa and Dad were politely impressed and even asked other details of the cat’s life, but Makkachin, from her comfy position on the plush floor rug, could not help but be intrigued by the strange markings on the slab.

To the left, spanning half of the stone, was the lanky, eerie silhouette of what seemed to be a man. And to his right were three more figures, smaller this time: waves, much like the currents of a river; what bafflingly appeared to be a gramophone (and this slab looked positively __ancient__, unless the stone, too, was a farce like its supposed owner); and finally, a strange insect that may have been a cricket.

It was all too soon when the sun began to set on the small farmhouse. Dad rose slowly, with all the grace of a dancer (and wouldn’t the little cat be surprised to learn whose house he had visited…?). “If you would like to stay the evening, you may want to follow me to our guestroom upstairs.”

“Oh, __marvelous__ idea, darling,” Papa smiled ever so sweetly. “I’ll fetch the spare linens from the basement closet, then. Makkachin, sweet girl, we’ll be back in a moment.”

And then Makkachin was alone in the family room, television sputtering light. The movement was enough to grab her attention, and she was greeted by the anchorman of the local evening news.

“__Breaking news this evening in Nowhere__,” he said, accent wide and reedy as always. “__Authorities are on the lookout for a____ currently unidentified____ cat who has reportedly stolen an ancient artifact found from an archaeological dig of the tomb of the famed King Ramses! The research team was en route to their home facility after returning to the country when they were held at gunpoint by the cat and his accomplice. The artifact in question is a stone slab estimated to be worth one million dollars. Police have found the body of the deceased accomplice____, now identified by authorities as Wilfredo ‘Freddy’ Gato__,__ but believe the cat is still at large. If anyone has any information on the whereabouts of this cat or this slab, please contact—__”

Makkachin’s puppy heart—which had been beating wildly during the report—nearly shot out of her chest when she heard a soft __thump__ behind her. To her surprise, Papa was standing at the entrance of the living room, blue eyes wide as saucers, linens carelessly fallen at his feet. He was still as glass for a moment, but he carefully leveled his gaze towards Makkachin.

“Sweet girl,” he said, voice __very__ quiet, “I want you to phone the police from the landline in the kitchen. I’m going to see if I can’t—”

“Oh, I wouldn’t do that if I was you, mutt.”

Their attention immediately whipped to the end of the staircase. There, a few steps up the way, was the little cat, pistol in paw, aimed slightly below him at Makkachin’s statue-still dad. Dad’s hands were in the air, and his pupils were blown wide in fear. Makkachin did not have to look at her Papa to know what expression he had on his face.

“See, here’s what’s gonna happen,” said the little cat, fedora shadowing his glowing yellow eyes. “We’re all gonna have a slumber party, __right here__. You guys are gonna be nice and snug in these here ropes for the night, and I’m gonna have a nice lil’ scavenger hunt. Don’t think I didn’t see all those pretty lookin’ medals and junk. And maybe, __maybe__ if you guys make it __reeeeeaaaaal__ easy for me, I won’t have to use this here gun. __Capiche__?”

At their slow nods, the cat grinned wide. “I knew you fellas would understand—and lady. Can’t forget the lil’ lady here.”

++++

So night found them—that is, her papa, her dad, and herself—tightly bound together with rather coarse rope. The slab, to which the cat had been so dedicated only moments before, had been placed to rest against the backboard of Papa’s sofa. Upstairs, they could hear quite the racket as the little cat robbed them of their valuables. Makkachin was using every inch of her will to not bark savagely. But then, ever so slightly, she felt her Papa tremble.

Large, near-viscous droplets of tears fell from his eyes. Papa was always such a pretty crier, or so Dad would say so fondly whenever they watched sad movies. In this moment, though, it only made Makkachin feel terrible. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I should have seen this coming a mile away. How could I have been so __stupid__?!”

“Vitya,” her dad murmured, low, like a groan. She could not see him clearly at this awkward angle, but she could hear his tears. “My love, __no__, how could you possibly blame yourself? If anything, I should not have been so eager to let him stay the night. I should have called the police from the moment he appeared at our doorstep with that wild story of his. God, how could this ever have been any of your fault?”

“Oh, __zolotse__…”

And in any other moment, her parents’ sappy endearments and encouragements would have made her roll her puppy eyes fondly. But something tickled at the back of her head in that second. Something was __very __wrong, suddenly—and it wasn’t the foul little cat upstairs making a mess of their home and lives.

Her eyes immediately zeroed over to the windows. The cat, for all his planning, had not thought to draw the curtains, though it hardly mattered. Makkachin could count on one paw the number of passersby she spotted in a __month__, let alone on an unfortunate night like this. Through the glass, though, she could see the once-clear night air slowly begin to thicken. It reminded her of the wafting curls of steam in Hasetsu’s onsens, of fog on St. Petersburg’s dewy morning streets.

And that’s when she realized it __was__ fog. Which was __utterly__ bizarre considering the sky had been otherwise clear until that moment. Something in her primal gut was telling her this was no ordinary fog, however, and maybe it was this same gut reaction that drew her eyes over to the slab—

Which had, until that moment, clearly shown the unsettling figure of a man. But slowly, __slowly__, this image was fading.

Her fathers must have felt her stiffen unnaturally, or perhaps she had even __whimpered__, because the two of them were craning their necks to look at her in concern before following her line of sight to the slab. And she felt the two of them freeze with her.

“Oh, Mother Mary above,” she heard her Papa murmur almost hysterically, a contrast to her dad’s stuttering intake of breath.

Dramatically on cue, the three of them heard a low, wispy, yet clear voice, coming from outside.

“__Return the slab… or suffer my curse…__”

In the distance of the fog, the family could see the wavering, uncannily graceful figure of the silhouetted man from the slab. He was there, uttering his warning, lurking in the mist. And Makkachin suddenly found herself praying to the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost, and even Vicchan himself that this night would not end terribly for them.

The little cat’s racket came to a stuttering halt upstairs before they heard the frantic pattering of feline paws down the staircase.

“Which one of you little rats called the police, eh?!” he screeched, the words sounding more like an alley cat’s yowl than actual human language. As if forgetting himself, he fumbled for the pistol in his pocket, and the family flinched.

“P-please!” Dad stammered. “How could we have called anyone?! We’re just as startled as you!”

Papa thought quickly. “Were there others targeting the slab as well? Perhaps they have tailed you here?” Point the blame at anyone else, just __not__ his little family.

The cat faltered, considering this heavily. “Um, you really think…?”

But the cat had no time to dwell on that thought further. The voice had returned.

“__This night, you will be visited by three plagues, each worse than the last… Return the slab…__”

All occupants of the home shivered at the voice, but the cat then bristled. “Oh, the wise guy thinks he can __scare__ me out of a million bucks?! He’s got another thing coming, then!” And the little cat cocked his pistol—

Only to be startled when a fat droplet of water fell on the barrel of the gun.

All four sets of eyes looked at the gun quizzically. What on earth…?

But one droplet turned into two, and within a few moments the entire ceiling was overcome with droplets of water, like a small rain shower localized entirely in their home. One quick glance at her fathers told her they were just as baffled as she was.

“You guys have a burst pipe or something?” surmised the little cat, eyeing his increasingly wet fur in distaste.

No, this made no sense. Makkachin looked at the slab. And whimpered.

The image of a wave was gone. And that eerie figure had mentioned the word “plague.” So, naturally, just when her mind put together the obvious, tragic outcome for her family and their little home, a torrent of water burst from the ceiling.

Their home was flooding, quickly, like a tank of water. Logically, it made no sense, but there still remained the fact that their home was very quickly filling. The little cat, stunned for a split second, proceeded to waste no time in scurrying up the stairs, quickly escaping the rising water. The three family members proceeded to attempt to follow suit, only to be inhibited by the ropes around them.

Her fathers cursed, and they attempted to coordinate their rise, but it was unfruitful. Makkachin thought in split seconds. Wriggling wildly, using her relatively small body to her advantage, she wriggled free from the very marginal gap the rope left. And, using strength she only ever found herself having in these odd, odd situations, she stood on her hind legs, hefted her parents up in her forepaws, and __ran__ up the stairs.

Water was coming from every unexpected nook and cranny of their tiny home—from behind their framed photo of the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics; bubbling from her spare water bowl right at the top of the stairs; pouring out of an antique hurricane lamp from Papa’s grandmother. It rose and swished and tumbled, like the waves of the ocean, like the flash of a riptide. And Makkachin could only go up, up, up to the attic, where __maybe__ the water would finally cease.

But, it continued to swell, and the little family found their hearts racing more and more as the water tickled the soles of their shoes, then their ankles, then their knees. Dad was scrambling to open the attic window, one that typically opened with such ease but now was firmly glued shut. Papa came to his aid, and even with their combined strength the window didn’t budge at all. Makkachin felt so clever to remember the chair facing their desktop computer, and then felt so foolish only moments later when the chair ricocheted off the glass like a plastic ping pong ball.

It was at their chins now (Makkachin was doggy paddling for her __life__), and her parents were clinging onto one another desperately. It would only continue to rise, and then what? Makkachin had to do something, __anything__—

Her parents were crying now, their tears mingling with the waves, and she knew she would do anything for them, just as they would do anything for her. So she took a deep, deep doggy breath, and __dove__.

Down, down, down she went, clawing through the attic door, swimming through the hallways, Give her a medal, Phelps, because she felt faster than anything! To her immense surprise, she passed the dreadful cat near the top of the stairs, clinging onto the slab for dear life as he took shuddering breaths through—just __where__ had he gotten that scuba gear?!

If the attic had not been the answer, then surely it must be in the basement, she reasoned. They had all sorts of knickknacks there. Maybe a hammer, to break the windows down, or the doors. How was the water not seeping through the screens? What even __was__ her life—

Oh. What’s that she sees?

Inconspicuous and small, at the center of the cement basement floor was something circular jutting from the surface. A metal chain glinted in the filtered light. Was that a drain plug in their basement?

It didn’t matter, but she had to try. Using the last bit of her strength, she glided to the chain and pulled, __tugged__, and then there was a dull, muffled, __pop__!

A pop, followed by __ow__. She felt like she’d been hit by Potya, if Potya was of the same size and density of an old dresser. Holy mother of everything, had she just been hit by a __dresser__?

Yes, and no. Yes, because that was most __definitely__ a dresser that had just smacked her in the doggy face, and no, because she’d also been hit by: (1), Papa’s old badminton kit; (2), a treadmill; (3), a heavy cardboard box, which, having been soaked through by a torrential downpour of cursed water, was flimsy enough to open and reveal her lost collection of tennis balls.

These were the things she noticed before being smothered by a pile of Lord knows what else, spiraling junk collecting towards the drain, and unfortunately, her. Eventually, however, the barrage ceased, and the shock wore off after several more moments. She sighed in relief.

What.

She wriggled from the gap between what had to be the World’s Ugliest Lamp (probably Dad’s) and her beloved box of soggy tennis balls to realize that the basement was no longer an underwater hellscape. Which meant…

“Makkachin?! Makkachin, darling, where are you??”

Oh, __oh__! Was that her dad she heard? After a precursory shake (though she felt she’d __never __be dry again), she pushed off with her paws and was scrambling up the stairs, little nails tapping against the hardwood floor. In all her excitement, she hardly realized her Papa had caught her until she was licking his face, his back flat on the floor. Dad was in hardly any better shape, soaked to the bone but looking breathlessly happy as he snuggled his husband and dog in their blissfully unflooded (sort of) living room.

“Oh, Yuuri,” crooned her Papa, “our sweet girl saved us! Isn’t that right, Makka-Makkachin?”

Ear rubs are the best, she decided, as she melted against her parents.

But their moment was ruined as they heard the hissing, hacking coughs of a disgruntled little cat as he clamored down the stairs, slab still in paw.

“Bl-blech, __ugh__! This water will __never__ dry out from my fur! __Agh__!!!” He set down the slab momentarily to wring out his fedora, now crumpled and completely bent out of shape. The cat fumbled for a bit more before he noticed the family in the living room. Her parents were rising as quickly as they could, though a bit bogged down by their heavy clothing.

“__You__!” hissed the little cat, pointing an accusatory paw in the vague direction of the family. “You stupid __dog__! I know this was somehow your fault! You’re in cahoots with the creep outside, arentcha?!”

“__Her__ fault?” Dad echoed incredulously. “__You’re__ the one who brought some weird cursed… __rock__… to our home! Take it and just leave! We don’t want anything to do with you, that slab, or any dirty money that comes with it!”

“Ha!” hacked out the cat. “You think I’m some sorta—some kinda __doofus__? You think I don’t __know__ the sorta mind tricks you folks’re playin’?! You’re just trying to __scare__ me into giving up the slab so you can make out with a million whole bucks! In fact, I bet this whole dump of a house is a ruse! What business do two ice skaters and a mutt have livin’ out in the middle of the boonies? Did Big Freddy put youse up to this?!”

Papa gave the clearly hysterical cat a bewildered frown. “Big… who…? No, wait. We have __nothing__ to do with this. Completely disregarding your __rude__ comments towards the home that my husband and I so __painstakingly__ built to occupy in peace, we knew __nothing__ of this nonsense until you came here, dragging in your filthy business! We have no need for your money. Take whatever you want from this house. Just leave our family alone!”

The cat looked completely unconvinced. “You really __do__ think I’m a moron! I-I’ll show you who’s the __real__ moron here!” And with a sneer, he dug into his deep coat pockets for his pistol—

Which was not there.

He paused, rummaged in the pocket a bit longer, as if it was deeper than it seemed, and then went for the other pocket, which also yielded nothing. The cat spun in a circle, perhaps thinking he’d dropped the gun on the floor, and then, wildly enough, checked his cap of all things.

Nothing.

Papa wasted no time, charging the cat with all his strength before tackling him and the slab to the floor. The cat, despite his previous distractions and his small stature, put up quite the fight, hissing and pulling with quite formidable strength. Dad did not falter before joining his husband, trying to tug the cat and his slab towards the door. But the cat stayed firmly in place, attempting to stand his ground with the cursed sheet of rock in his paws.

Makkachin was ready to end this ridiculousness and growled, eyeing his thin feline hindlegs as a very vulnerable target.

“__Return the slab…__”

She paused, but the scuffle between her parents and the cat continued, so absorbed they were in their pulling and tugging that they hardly heard the near-whisper of the apparition outside. Makkachin trembled, but still hazarded a glance out the window.

He was closer now. And she could see him.

The first thing she noticed that, without a doubt, this man was dead. His skin was leathery, decayed and ancient in the way that popularized depictions of mummies could only pretend to mimic. It was stretched tight over the skeletal curvature and sharp angles of his skull, as well as over the unnaturally-angled joints of his fingers.

His eyes were… not human. They were heavily lidded, and at first she thought there weren’t any eyes to begin with because she could see the full expanse of his eye sockets, but then she saw a slit of a blue, eerie glow.

The rest of him was willowy, wispy, like the whisper of a memory, the drag of stale wind against stone. He had old, __old__ rags on him that covered up the rest of his grotesque figure, and strands of dull maroon hair that clung to his skull like an afterthought.

Makkachin thought she was going to be sick.

“__Return the slab… or suffer my curse…__”

She eyed the slab, its face staring right at her as the three others quarreled. Slowly, like sand falling through fingers, the image of the very out-of-place gramophone faded.

And then it hit them.

The __worst__ disco music she’d __ever__ heard in her life. __Ever__. Even factoring in the 2019 World’s afterparty.

At first, it was so startling that it was funny, but the sound was so loud that it became annoying more than anything. And then it __hurt__.

Her parents fell to their knees, their palms uselessly covering their ears from the assault of some man’s near-unintelligible vibrato over the world’s corniest electric keyboard minor cord progression. The cat was in no better shape, screeching at the sound, his feline torso hunched over the slab that had fallen to the ground.

Makkachin nearly howled at the grating music that seemed to be coming from everywhere, but the added noise would only serve to aggravate her pounding head even further. In her hazy mind, she glanced again at her parents.

Dad was almost completely to the ground, his shoulders trembling. Papa looked white as a sheet, tears streaming from his eyes. She saw, rather than heard, him mouth, then:

“God, make it __stop__!”

Oh, the things she did for love.

Makkachin’s first mush-brained, precursory search of the house yielded nothing but water-logged furniture, flooded floorboards, and a baseball bat that Yuri left here during his last visit. Of course. So she decided, then, the source of the… whatever it was… must be coming from outside. Perhaps the chicken coop? No? Then, somehow it must be under the water pump? No to that, too (and Dad was __not__ going to be pleased that she’d somehow uprooted the water pump __again__). In the squash garden? In Papa’s marigolds? No, no, but it __had__ to be coming from outside because it was even __louder__ out here, and she was going to __bash her head into that boulder over there if this racket didn’t STOP!__

… Oh. There was a boulder there, wasn’t there?

She scrambled towards it, and the music grew louder, and louder, until it was as if she could feel those wretched soundwaves slapping the poodle curls of her doggy face. She blinked, only to find indeed a positively ancient-looking gramophone (yet still horribly out of place in all of this, no matter how old it looked). A warped record was whirring on a rotting turntable, the center style emitting a faint screeching noise as it scraped across vinyl. God, it was an abomination.

Makkachin raised the bat she’d found earlier and, with all her doggy might, gave the gramophone ten good whacks, reducing it to broken splinters and shards. And, even though it was very well broken and the sound had ceased after the first strike, she gave it several more hits just for the satisfaction, hard enough to crack the bat in half.

Distantly, she heard someone snapping as if in disappointment, but she disregarded this and made her way back to the farmhouse.

Her parents looked positively relieved, if not completely worn out. The cat, wretched and awful as he was, was once again clinging to the slab, puffs of cotton stuffed in his large, cat ears.

She’d __had__ it with this cat. He’d come in and ruined their lunch, and then brought some __cursed__, __oversized__ __PEBBLE__ that had the added benefit of dragging along with it some dead guy whose list of suitable plagues included death by deplorable disco! He’d held them at gunpoint, ransacked their house, and don’t even get her STARTED on the insurance claims they were going to have to push through because of the sheer water damage they’d amassed!

Makkachin growled. Despite the thick cotton plugging his ears, the cat flinched and rose warily. The motion was enough to jostle the wads out of place, and they fell to the floor silently. She didn’t care what happened to that cat. All she knew was that slab needed to __leave__, preferably with the cat attached. But she’d need to get it first. So with a rumble deep, deep in her dog belly, she lunged for it.

“H-hey, you crazy mutt, h—NO! BAD DOG! __BAD DOGGY__!”

Like she’d noticed earlier, the cat had __quite__ the grip. The stone was firmly wrenched between her jaws on one end and was in a deadlocked grip between cat paws on the other. Both cat and dog tugged and pulled and tugged and pulled, until the cat let out a furious yowl and lifted the slab with poodle attached.

“__LET. GO. OF. MY. SLAB!!!__”

Makkachin’s retort was muffled through her mouthful of ancient cursed rock, but the cat got the gist of it and said something equally rude and inappropriate.

Shocked as they were by Makkachin’s very out-of-character bout of violence, her parents were momentarily rooted in place, watching the ridiculous display between the cat and dog, the two practically spinning in place. And then, it happened again.

(Not that either animal was calm enough to hear the quiet voice.)

“__Return the slab… or suffer my curse…__”

“Th-there were three of them, right?” remembered Dad, eyeing the two animals who were almost vainly rumbling about the living room. “I saw the slab. Next to the… the man. There was the flood, and then the music. And then there was something else… Crickets? They looked like crickets, right? What would crickets do?”

Papa shuddered. “No, my dear. The last plague isn’t crickets.”

Outside, there was a rustle. It sounded like the rustle of dry leaves-- very uncharacteristic for their dry little home. But it grew louder, and louder, and __buzzed__. A cloud was rolling slowly past the horizon, black and heavy like a storm.

“Those are locusts.”

++++

When Viktor was a boy, his grandmother took him to church. Mother and Father sometimes had to work, and so his grandmother, God-fearing and orthodox as she was, would knock on their door early in the morning.

“__The Lord gave us a day of rest, Vitya. The Lord gave us the Sabbath. We rest on this day and dedicate it to Him. Don’t forget this, Vitya, like your silly parents have.”__

And he would chirp, “__Yes, Babushka__,” in his charming, sweet little voice, and his grandmother would coo, and as soon as he was old enough to not have to be minded at home he forgot all about the Sabbath and keeping it holy.

But he would never forget Father Semenov. His sermons were terrifying, enchanting, dramatic. Stern and dark as the man was, Viktor always had been excited to hear the man and his retelling of the word of God. And he would never, ever forget the story of Moses and his trials to free the Jewish people from slavery to the Egyptians.

God plagued the Egyptians, plagued them for the pride of their pharaoh, for thinking they were above the will of the Holy Father. In Moses, he sent them diseases, pests, blood and death. He stole the sun from the sky for days on end. The land was ruined by storms like anything unseen.

And he sent them locusts.

Viktor didn’t know what a locust was, at the time. So Father Semenov had described it in his thunderous voice, and Victor had imagined demons, or ghouls, maybe beasts or something equally garish. Because, after all the plagues God had sent, which had wiped the Egyptians of much at that point, the locusts had taken the rest. They swarmed the earth and made it invisible, numerous as they were. They infested homes, ate what was left of the crops, saw green and made it theirs, every plant and sprout and fruit left.

Locusts consumed, greedy, all-encompassing. They must be powerful, thought Viktor, so unknowing. Surely, they are mighty beasts, horrifying and grotesque, with maws that could snap a child in half, let alone devour entire crops in the blink of an eye. He would have looked them up in his father’s reference books that very day, but his grandmother had swatted his hands from the shelves and said, “__The Sabbath should only be honored by the scripture, not by the silly words of man__.”

So, bright and early the next morning (because he had slept fitfully that night after thinking of more fantastic and dreadful images of locusts), he rummaged through his father’s books.

“__Let’s see… No—Ah! Here it is. Саранча.” __

And… how funny it was. Here he had been imagining every devil under the sun and hidden from the sun. And a locust was… a bug? Larger than a cricket, surely, but similar in build, no? Its jaws were certainly… unfortunate… but not ghastly. Not large enough to swallow a house! Surely not. They were destructive in numbers, was the thing. Killed crops, ate the food that men worked hard to produce. But they were no creatures of the night, no terrifying things with rows of sharp teeth and horns and pointed tails. No, just small bugs.

Viktor had laughed and laughed, because who could ever really __fear__ locusts? Pests, sure they were. But they were only bugs.

And he thinks of this now, as a cloud of black approaches his home, and in his home were his darling husband and dog. He can hear their jaws clenching desperately, their wings vibrating. They were hungry, surely. Starving, __ravenous__, and wanted to consume __everything__. Surely these were not normal locusts, ones that only ate the greenery of the earth.

Would they devour flesh, too?

He doesn’t even stop to think about it.

“We need to leave immediately.” The words fly from his mouth quickly, but not as quick as his hands scramble for Yuuri’s green sleeves.

Yuuri looks at him, somehow bewildered, as if Viktor’s statement is the craziest thing he’s witnessed all evening between nearly drowning and being potentially cursed by a ginger-haired ghoul.

“Leave where?” he asks. His single-minded focus on Viktor is admittedly impressive given the increasingly noisy rustle of incoming locusts and the sudden wild yowls from that back-alley mongrel of a cat. Makkachin seems to have torn a sizable patch of fur from his muzzle. How admirable, his sweet poodle.

“Anywhere that isn’t here, my dear.” He’s trying to think of where his keys are (__and God, that hum was positively maddening__). Yuuri always scolded him for not putting them on the key rack he’d screwed into the wall their first week on the farm. He wishes he could travel back in time and wring his own neck for not listening to his husband’s wisdom. Better yet, he wishes he could stop himself from inviting in that wretched feline to their peaceful little home.

Yuuri is flabbergasted. “A-and leave the farm? Vitya, this farm is our __everything__. How could we possibly just leave it to be ravaged by--” he flounders a bit, then, “--by a cursed cat and some bugs?!”

A cruel part of Viktor wants to berate his husband for being selfish, so consumed by their worldly belongings that could so easily (__relatively, maybe__) be replaced. But he knows, deep down, that Yuuri is only thinking of all the time and effort they’d put into moving their __everything__ into this little home, this little peaceful haven they had in the middle of Nowhere. It was so difficult, and it took so much time and ridicule and--

No. They could do it again. They just needed the opportunity to do so. Because the hum of locusts was so close, after all.

He’s going to say something that will hopefully convince Yuuri to just damn __agree__ with him when they both whip their attention towards a rather jarring __thump__ against the wall.

++++

Makkachin wants to file a complaint against the higher-ups today. Her head is pounding from where it hit the wall-- rather painfully, might she add, and that blasted cat had __quite__ the surprising right hook. A lot of power for such a tiny paw. No matter. She’d dealt a good deal of damage to that nuisance, so the scales weren’t quite tipped against her, right? Only dimly is she aware of her parents’ outraged cries. Why are there four of her dads? Gosh, she’s seeing stars, too. And Potya’s dancing the tango with little Yuri in the corner--

“NO ONE is going __ANYWHERE__!” screeches the cat, eyes feral. “I’m sick of these little magic tricks! Big Freddy thought he’d pull a fast one over me with some washed-up dancing sideshows and their stupid dog, but I’ve always been the faster cat! I’ve ALWAYS had the last laugh! And this time won’t be any different!”

She hears more shouting from her parents, and the shouting sounds more like screaming the more she thinks about it, but it’s all being muffled by the fog in her head and the terrible __buzzing__ she’s hearing in the background. It must all be coming from her head. She’s knocked it pretty badly, and that’s probably why she’s seeing cats doing triple axels off the sofa. It’s all so muddy: the buzzing, the shouting, the hisses, the hard thwack of what might be stone, and a thump, and--

“__YUURI__!”

Makkachin feels like she’s been pulled from a deep, dark sleep. Her heart is beating miles a second, and she looks around wildly. The door has been slammed open, the forest green door practically vibrating at the hinges from the force with which it was pulled. By the door lies __quite__ the sizable clump of cat fur, and then a small sprinkle of blood that she would hardly notice if she didn’t have a dog’s nose, and--

Dad?

She scrambling to her paws as fast as she can. He looks awful there, crumpled to the ground in his oversized sweater that’s all wrinkled and soiled, glasses broken and scattered not far off from his head. When she’s close enough to get a good look at his face, it’s slack-jawed, an angry, reddish-purple streak across his cheek. Makkachin feels like the ground underneath her might open up and swallow her whole because her dad isn’t really moving. Not at all, not even a rustle.

And then there’s a blessed groan of an exhale, followed by an agonized hiss of pain.

Her tail wags involuntarily. Ah, holy mother of everything, __agh__. That’d been positively __frightening__.

“__Makka__,” her dad moans, feeling her doggy tongue lapping against his forehead. “__Get Vitya__…”

And on cue, there’s a frustrated screech from outside, an unholy sound that she’d only ever heard come from her papa. Reassured that her dad was okay for the time being, she scrambled out of the house, nails clicking wildly against the hardwood before her paws were kicking up dust. Up the way a bit is her papa being dragged along the soil like a sack of potatoes, and hauling him along is that godawful devil of a cat.

“You can’t fool me, Freddy!” He’s grunting with exertion, dragging a grown man over twice his size behind him one-handed, slab clutched protectively against his chest. “Not an ice ball’s chance in __hell__ will ya pull a fast one over me! I don’t care what kind of crazy Hollywood CGI __crap__ you’ve gotten your hands on this time, but I know a scam when I see one!”

Getting closer is the cloud of locusts, their buzzing nearly as maddening as the disco from mere moments before. And then, a bit nearer still, is that rotting monstrosity, looking a mere moment from being blown away by the softest breeze, yet still so ominous.

“You were gonna sell me out to the pigs, you lousy __traitor__!” The cat is practically spitting, and he sounds absolutely unhinged. “I knew it from the moment you didn’t show up at the pickup point! I __knew__ you were gonna let me take the fall for all this! But guess __what__, Freddy?! Your stupid, piece of crap tricks didn’t work on me! You think you’re gonna make off like a bandit with one million, huh?! FAT CHANCE!”

Her papa struggles enough that he’s out of the cat’s grasp, roaring the whole time. The cat yowls, startled, and then glares at her papa with a deranged intensity she’d never seen. With a cruel scowl and surprising force, he kicks her papa square in the gut, and he rolls over a few times like a tossed ragdoll. He makes a terrible noise after that, dry heaving into the dirt before falling limp, breathing ragged. She’s never seen him so awful. Never seen __either__ of her parents look so miserable.

She’s ultra finished with this now.

Makkachin has the upper hand this time, sneaking up on this ugly, stupid little cat when he thought he’d taken care of them well enough. He screams something awful when she lunges at him, screams unlike anything she’s ever heard in her life, but she can’t bring herself to care. All she focuses on is clamping her sharp teeth around his neck, not allowing his wild thrashing to throw her off once again.

“YOU STUPID DOG!!” he bellows, choked between consonants, trying to knock her away with the slab. But she got one over this conniving little demon, and he can’t quite get at her like he wants. She’s rabid with anger, practically out of her mind with it. Her head is shaking from side to side, teeth sinking deeper, and __deeper__, and now her mouth is __hot and wet__\--

And all the while there’s that buzz, that __buzz__ of the locusts, and the hollow request of a dead king not too far away.

“__Return the slab__…”

“__Return the slab__…”

The cat isn’t moving anymore. She’s made sure of that. No more threats of pistols, no more of his ridiculous demands and delusions. How could one little cat cause so much chaos? Why __her__ family? And all over some stupid, forsaken, __fucking__ slab--

It’s on the ground now. The cat had dropped it some time ago, surely, and there were a few specks of… Well, it was mostly untarnished. Surely that was okay. She drops the limp cat from her jaws and grabs the slab instead, trotting forward towards that ghostly figure.

“__Return the slab… or suffer my curse.__”

Up close he’s unearthly. He is the epitome of rot, of death. She smells it on him like she smells it on her muzzle, and it’s nauseating. But she can’t look away from his eyes, from the inhuman glow of his gaze. She has his slab all right. Here it is! And here’s the little bastard that started the whole mess! Wretched, filthy little thief, hurting her fathers and ruining their quiet little home.

Makkachin would do anything for love. __Anything__.

The locusts are above her, a dark storm cloud, a deafening buzz. They whip past the fur of her cheeks so quickly that it practically stings. The dead king looks at her with his skeletal, serene grin, and says something.

She can’t hear it as no other sound carries above the ravenous chattering of the locusts. Makkachin wants to beg for the mercy of this vengeful ghost, wants more than anything for her sweet fathers to stay safe. But her eyes unwillingly droop shut, her body exhausted beyond belief.

All that remains is the hum, a king’s blue stare, and--

++++

Makkachin howls, and the sound is so dreadful that it startles her awake.

Well, that, and the jolt of the soft thighs pillowing her head, the jerk of the careful hands running through her fur.

“Makka, sweet girl, whatever is the matter?”

She could distinguish that cooing voice from a million voices in an Olympic-sized stadium. Her papa is cradling her face softly in his hands, his eyes concerned and tender. Dad is just as worried, just a touch more flustered, completely thrown off by the heart-wrenching howl she’d let out.

“Oh my word, did you have a bad dream, Makkachin?” Her dad is sweet as always, and his hands are always so soft and warm. She can already feel a content little doggy huff working its way up to her snout.

Viktor is pensive, frowning at nothing in particular. “Poor thing must have been dreaming of all this dreadful nonsense blaring on the television.”

“Blaring” was a rather strong word for the quiet, reedy drone of the local anchorman coming from across the room.

“__The Nowhere Police Department have finally located the famous Slab of King Ramses, an ancient priceless artifact that has been missing for several days now. The slab was anonymously returned to the station early this morning, and authorities are now currently cooperating with Interpol to coordinate its safe delivery to its original excavation site after outrage from various activism groups. Authorities believe the theft to be the work of notorious criminal Wilfredo ‘Freddy’ Gato and his still unidentified cat accomplice. Gato was found fatally mutilated on the outskirts of Nowhere City limits. Authorities believe this to be the work of his accomplice, pictured here. The culprit is still at large, and is currently being charged for--__”

“Ah, really, Vitya, we needn’t listen to such depressing news anymore,” tuts her dad as he clicks the television off with the press of a button. “How about a relaxing pot of tea instead? I’ll even bring out the jam for you heathens.”

Makkachin feels her fluffy tail wag in excitement. She was always excited when Dad brewed them a good traditional cup of Russian tea! Papa was no less excited, eyes shining like gems. Dad could only laugh at the two of them, rolling his eyes fondly as he made his way to the kitchen and put on his yellow apron. Whatever bad dream she’d had was inconsequential now in the face of a tasty treat.

Like the faithful pooch she was, she trotted happily behind her papa as he made his way into the kitchen after his husband. He, too, donned an apron to help out, conversationally making an idle, confused remark about the soggy tennis balls he’d found when cleaning the basement earlier in the day.

The sweet little family of three sat down not much later at the kitchen table, trading laughs and smiles and looks of love. Makkachin wouldn’t trade a single thing in the world for this, not even the best bones or treats or squeaky toys. She would do absolutely anything for the love of her wonderful parents.

And the best part of that evening? Why, Dad was going to make them a lovely dinner of katsudon, complete with his magical fried eggs and their runny yolks!

How delightful! Makkachin had awoken to the strangest, most intense craving for something savory and warm and __wet__ in her adorable doggy chops.

**Author's Note:**

> (I really do like cats. I swear.)
> 
> Thanks again for taking a peek at this!!! (*≧∀≦)ゞ


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